†††
“THERE’S a lot of them.”
“He said it was too much of a hassle to investigate and eliminate them in advance, so he’s leaving them all to us. Apparently, they’re also having troubles because they have to shore up their defenses as well,” said Tiegel. Thinking of the person he was likely talking about made some real hostile aura slip out of me as I thought about how much I wanted to kill him.
“…Things will only get more complicated if you kill him,” warned Tiegel.
“I know. And even I’d have a hard time taking on Rick.”
The moon beautifully illuminated the night castle. Tiegel and I were witness to a mad dance unsuited to the majesty of the place yet also completely suited to the place, considering the nature of a castle.
Corpses lay at our feet. Blood leapt through the air, dying me the same color.
You could say this was the most beautiful sight in the world.
They were assassins sent by Ismail and Aisha’s parents to kill Shaghad. While they may be the twins’ parents, Raheem was also Shaghad’s father. He was trying to kill his own son.
“Raheem is a prince, but not really, right?” asked Tiegel.
“He was removed from the line of succession, but he is still royalty. That hasn’t changed the fact that he’s the son of the current king. Publicly, the king’s reason for letting him stay in the palace was fatherly love and sympathy. But Rick said it was really because there would be less damage and a smaller impact if he kept Raheem where he could see him, manipulating him in the palm of his hand until he destroys himself, rather than if he let him go somewhere else and do something he shouldn’t.”
“Resulting in us being overworked.”
There was fatigue in Tiegel’s voice, which wasn’t surprising. We’d been eliminating assassins every night for days in a row. Then, during the day, we were Shaghad’s guards.
Maybe Rick mistook Tiegel and me for some sort of weapons that couldn’t die.
“How is the miniature gun feeling?” asked Tiegel.
“Not bad. Though I have mixed feelings about it when I consider the possibility it was repayment for the work Rick overloads on us like he is now.”
I pulled the trigger and killed an enemy a good distance away while slicing down another enemy right in front of me with my favorite dagger.
Before, I could only fight in close range, but this gun let me handle mid-range combat as well. That shortened battle times even when there were many opponents. Even so, the fatigue was starting to build up.
“I never killed this many people in my last life…” I murmured.
“What was that, Lady Selena?”
“Nothing.”
Of course I hadn’t. I was an assassin in my last life. I was generally targeting just one person at a time. My job this time, though, was defending, which meant eliminating all enemies.
I never knew defenders killed more than assassins.
That knight who took me down with him, did he learn his skills for killing through facing this sort of situation over and over again, all just to protect a ruler?
“Dammit, there’s only two of them,” said one of the surviving assassins.
“And one’s a girl. Why are we having such a hard time against them?!” said another, insulting us. These third-rate assassins failed to evaluate their opponents’ strength because they had an overwhelming advantage in numbers.
Compared to the country I lived in in my previous life, the assassins in Astra and Rienbul were both rather unskilled.
I guess that’s just how peaceful it is here.
“We’re in a different league,” I said and aimed my gun at one man. He looked at me in terror. He couldn’t even fight back when faced with the fear of death.
I looked at him, exasperated at how he feared death despite being an assassin, and pulled the trigger.
“Shit, steal that girl’s weapon!”
“That’s impossible! It doesn’t make any sound; we can’t even see it. The wounds it leaves are tiny, but…but…I blink, and everyone’s dead!”
Fear of the unknown, hm?
“Tiegel, do you know what makes monsters frightening?”
“Hm? I suppose it’s that we don’t understand them?”
“Exactly. Monsters are unknown, and therefore, they’re frightening.”
Tiegel looked at the assassins, who were in chaos over their fear of this unknown weapon called a “gun.”
“Meaning, that weapon is a sort of monster to them?”
“It is. If that’s the case, I wonder how they see me, the person using this monster.”
I pointed my gun and pulled the trigger even at those who lost all drive to fight and were, therefore, not even enemies. I kept pulling the trigger until all their bodies lay on the ground.